1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to road detection, and specifically, a method and a device for detecting a drivable region of a road.
2. Description of the Related Art
Currently, a driving assistance technology of an automobile is studied. This technology can provide needed information and/or warning to a user when the user drives the car, so that a dangerous situation such as a vehicle collision or vehicle deviation from the road can be avoided. Furthermore, the driving assistance technology may be used to control the moving of the car automatically in some cases.
In the driving assistance technology, it is important to detect the drivable region of the road correctly. Many methods for detecting the drivable region of the road have been disclosed. For example, U.S. Patent Application Publication US20100250064A1 discloses a method for detecting a drivable region by using the white lines on both sides of the road, however such a method cannot be applied to a road where the white lines do not exist on both sides thereof. The U.S. Patent Application Publication US20050015201A1 discloses a method for segmenting a road and detecting a drivable region by a distance and a segmental slope, however such a method cannot be applied to a sparse disparity map where points on the road are sparse.
Therefore, there is a demand for providing a method and device for reliably detecting a drivable region of a road.